Statue of Karl Marx on his grave stone in Highgate Cemetery, London. A picture of Karl Marx. Scenes in the Soviet Union. Soviet soldiers walking slowly in loose formation. Bolsheviks standing with a large banner. Damaged shops on a street. "One way" street signs in several languages. Large gathering of people carrying signs reading: "Frieden" (Peace, in German). A sign reading: "HALT, Landesgrenze" marking a German provincial boundary. A sign in German, designating the customs border at Furth im Wald, Bavaria ("Zollgrenz-Bezirk, Furth i.Wald"). East German border guards setting obstacles and sentry paths. Picture of Günter Litfin, a twenty-four-year-old tailor, who swam across the Spree Canal to West Germany on 24 August 1961. View of him being fatally shot from across the border, by East German guards, as he is being pulled into West Germany (the first such fatality at the East West German border). Animated map of the world with label references to Berlin,1961; Havana, 1959; Budapest, 1956; Coyoacan, 1940; and Kronstadt, 1921.

On the one year anniversary of Adolf Hitler rising to power as Chancellor and Fuhrer in Germany, Americans assemble in Madison Square Garden, New York to denounce Adolf Hitler's ascendancy in Germany. People gathered in Madison Square Garden including New York Governor Al Smith, Ray Moley (seen speaking at podium), Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, and Mayor Fiorello La Guardia (also seen speaking at podium). Views of dignitaries on platform and of the gathering of 20,000 attendees in Madison Square Garden. Photographers click pictures. People watch and listen. From a March 12, 1959 newsreel featuring events from 25 years earlier.

In September, 1959, United States President Dwight Eisenhower arrives in Berlin, aboard a Boeing VC-137B aircraft (Air Force One). He is greeted by German President Konrad Adenauer. An honor guard of German soldiers salute him. President Eisenhower speaks at the airport and then stands in an open car with motorcade through streets of Berlin. Germans hold up a banner reading: '70 000 000 Germans rely on you'. A replica of the American Liberty Bell rings, in the Town Hall of Schöneberg, Germany, as two children watch from below, and one holds her ears. A woman is interviewed, by an American soldier, for the Forces radio Network, about the meaning of the freedom bell to her. Huge crowd gathered in a stadium to celebrate "Berlin Bleibt Frei" (Berlin remains free). Elements of the U.S. Seventh Army on parade. A little German schoolboy stops on a cobblestone street to look and listen to the Freedom Bell ringing from the Town Hall in Schöneberg. He runs and catches up with his mother.

Film 'The Road to the Wall' depicts the rise of communism in Russia, Eastern Europe, China and Cuba. Refugees walk on the road and uphill with baggage in hand. Communist troops march. Refugees walk bare foot. Man carrying a child on his back. Huge gathering of people at the Kremlin wall (near future site of Lenin's tomb). Vladimir Ilyich Lenin haranguing a crowd during the Russian Revolution. Refugee women and children being checked by soldiers as they attempt to board a train. Closeup of a baby. Bodies of fallen refugees. Fidel Castro, in 1959, with Che Guevara, and other revolutionaries, in Cuba. A person being executed by a Che Guevara revolutionary firing squad. Huge parade in Communist China in 1960. View of Chinese workers manually pulling what appears to be, a heavy gun carriage. Parade of communists in East Germany in 1961. The Berlin wall, and East German policeman on horseback riding to intercept persons attempting to cross. A few East German people makingtheir escape from East Berlin to West Berlin by running through a gap in barbed wire at the Berlin Wall border, and being escorted by West Berliners afterward. Armed East German guards at border marked with barbed wire and other obstacles.

U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower visits Bonn, Germany. President Eisenhower arrives at Bonn during his European Tour. Flags of the United States and Germany. Dignitaries receive and greet Eisenhower as he disembarks from an aircraft at an airport. He greets the lined up officers. During his speech he declares that the United States will stand by West Berlin. Civilians wave and greet Eisenhower as his motorcade passes through a street.

A taxicab driver being interviewed in Berlin, Germany. Man comes near the taxicab driver. Driver standing near his car. He is asked about the meaning of the Brandenburg Gate to the Berliners. He replies that the Brandenburg Gate has a special meaning for the people of Berlin. It is a symbol of United Germany. He gets inside the car after the interview.